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Sex slaves: trafficking of women in Asia

Chapter Seven: The Law - part 2

Part 2: 7.11: Rape provoking to become a prostitute in Pakistan  -- 7.12: Handling of law with "accidents" or bribes -- 7.13: Legalization of prostitution and the new possibilities -- 7.14: Police, protection money and sexual service for police forces in the prostitution business -- 7.15: Law prohibiting slavery and human trafficking - mentality questions

by Louise Brown

presented and with subtitles by Michael  Palomino (2013)

7.11: Rape provoking to become a prostitute in Pakistan

[Pakistan is an Islamic country without enlightenment concerning sexuality and tenderness. The regulations against free love are very rude, and fear is great for fighting for justice because revenge is a constant threat. These conditions not only exist in Pakistan, but also in South "America" in many not so developed "Christian" countries with their "venganzas". Also in Peru there exists the "custom" in the countryside that a raped woman has to marry her rapist - yes, this is true. Let's see about Pakistan. Unfortunately positive cases with arrangements without violence are not mentioned. There is not even a percentage quota indicated and thus this work is a collection of data but not so scientific!]

Rape in controlled societies - NGO against rape in Pakistan - nobody wants a raped woman - probable prostitution - silence

In essence, it will not make a difference. In societies in which there is a premium placed upon virginity and where women's sexuality is tightly controlled, rape can effectively strip a woman of self-esteem and can prepare her for prostitution. War Against Rape is a Pakistani NGO working to help the victims of sexual abuse and to assist them in returning to normal life [8]. [Well, after a rape there is no return to a "normal life", but sex slavery can be hindered, this is ment with it].

[8] I am grateful to War Against Rape in Lahore, Pakistan, for information on its experience in working with the victim of rape.

The organization's task is monumental because the victims are seen by large sections of society as having been shamed and as having incited [provoked] the rapist by being available to be raped. This even applies to the child victims of sexual abuse. To compound the problem, a raped woman is marked out as a certain candidate for further sexual assault. She becomes public property and, as no one would want to marry her, raped girls frequently find themselves drawn into prostitution.

Disabled by mental frameworks (p.198)

like these it is not surprising that women in sexual slavery in Pakistan fail to speak out against the men who trafficked them or forced them into prostitution.

An entire religious, social and cultural matrix discourages women from pressing charges. Many parents would prefer to hush up a daughter's involvement in prostitution rather than to take action against those who coerced or encouraged her into the business. They do this for their own benefit and for that of their daughter. Many women feel shamed by sex work. They do not want to talk about their shame while standing in courts full of men who will treat them with contempt [degrading the woman]. Many women are also fearful [because in Pakistan killing of a raped woman does not count much as it seems]. Throughout Asia, trafficked women and those forced into sexual slavery are afraid that speaking out will endanger their own lives or the lives of their families.


7.12: Handling of law with "accidents" or bribes

"Accidents" in Japan eliminating the rebellious Thai prostitute

During my last visit to Japan in August 1999 the staff of an NGO that deals with women's issues spoke of their anger and sadness at a recent and suspicious tragedy. One of the Thai victims of trafficking and sexual abuse in Japan had taken the incredibly brave step of providing evidence against her captors. The woman had returned to Thailand [as a dead body] pending the court case. This fearless woman was killed in a road traffic accident before she could give evidence.

In areas where trafficking for prostitution is a local specialty there is intense social pressure for girls to keep quiet and to keep the system going by their silence. To provide evidence against [mostly WOMAN] recruiters, [WOMAN] agents and [mostly WOMAN] brothel owners in this instance would be tantamount to treason and to an attack upon their own families and the entire community. [In the case of a rebellion against being quiet] Girls could expect severe recriminations. To add to this, there is also political pressure and the pressure of the wallet.

Bribes in Nepal or process manipulations in India with Nepali prostitutes

Nepali women, for instance, are intimidated and offered bribes to drop cases [9].

[9] Human Rights Watch / Asia: Rape for Profit: Trafficking of Nepali Girls and Women to India's Brothels (New York, 1996), p.57

Traffickers are also released on the orders of Nepali politicians [10].

[10] Gauri Pradhan: 'The Road to Bombay: Forgotten women'; In: ABC Nepal: Red Light Traffic: The Trade in Nepali Girls (Kathmandu, 1996), p.38

and cases are abandoned because of a sudden and suspicious lack of evidence [destruction of evidence by bribed justice].


7.13: Legalization of prostitution and the new possibilities

Legalization of prostitution would permit more abuse - legalization would give more rights and fight for rights

One school of thought argues that many abuses in the sex industry would be eradicated if prostitution was legalized. This argument (p.199)

completely bypasses the issue of the greatest importance. The greatest abuse is that sex can be bought and that people - specifically women and children, but also men - are valued for their bodies and their sexual functions. But even if we dismiss [give up] this basic point, the thesis that legalization will curtail [reduzieren] terrible abuses is difficult to apply, especially in the context of Asian societies. Lalitha Nayak of India's Joint Women's Program is an activist working on trafficking and prostitution in India. Her view on the legalization of prostitution is very clear, very hostile, and also very representative of the approach taken by a large proportion of women activist in South Asia. Legalization, she argues, will make matters worse because it will give families and men the license to legally exploit and abuse females. Removing the restriction on prostitution in a society in which women are devalued will not actually halt abuses. Instead it will only serve to encourage them. The present laws may not be good but they form a minimum line of defense against even grater abuses.

[WRONG: legalization of prostitution is good - the following points are not considered:
-- legalization of prostitution will give a right to speak about it for everybody what is not the case when prostitution is not legalized
-- legalization of prostitution will eliminate the abuse because controls can be officially and rights of the prostitutes will be officially recognized
-- legalization of prostitution can create many organizations giving help to prostitutes officially which is not possible when prostitutes are considered illegal
-- and legalization of prostitution can also create the possibility of an official income and paying taxes by the prostitutes.

Thus all arguments against legalization of prostitution are not valid because sociological developments are not considered. Of course a country should have a nation wide birth registration system for the control of the age, in tropical regions without a good education system the limit can be 16. It depends
-- on the education system
-- on the job possibilities, and
-- on the free sports facilities in a community for more self-esteem

If prostitution is an attractive "solution" for a family or not. Add to this alcohol abuse and smoking can be better controlled when prostitutes are not considered illegal. Unfortunately not one point is cited in the book of Louise Brown].

Thailand: prostitution is a "form of work"

There is another approach to prostitution, and one that finds particular favor in Thailand. This view accepts prostitution as a form of work and advocates that the industry should be decriminalized, regularized and for it to be subject to the same kind of regulations and safeguards as other industries.

[This official legalization of prostitution in Thailand is not realized until 2013].

Legalization of prostitution would provoke official statistics - and the possibility of taxing

A 1998 report by the International Labor Organization on the sex sector in four countries of South-East Asia drew attention to the size of the industry, as if this was a reason that it should be legitimized [11].

[11] Lin Lean Lim: The Sex Sector.

Acknowledging the importance of the sex business and bringing it within the purview [the reach] of the law would be good for the economic profiles of these countries. Statistics on the turnover of the sex trade would add to the figures on Gross Domestic Product and the lucrative industry could be taxed. The state, rather than just corrupt individuals within it, could profit handsomely from an expanding business.

[Possibility of a security seal for brothels
Legalization of prostitution would also give the possibility of a rating of brothels, which are controlled and which are not, which pay tax and which not, which have controlled girls and women and which have not. Tourists and locals could be safe in brothels with a security seal].

Writer Louise Brown offending legalization of prostitution and offending men again

The Global Alliance Against the Traffic in Women (GAATW) is an international NGO and is based in Bangkok. It works to end the (p.200)

abuses in the industry and simultaneously to promote the concept of prostitution as a viable career option. Siriporn Skrobanek, the chair of GAATW, explains that we cannot deprive poor women of the right to earn a living. She insists, 'Women should have the right to choose to become a sex worker if they wish. The important thing is that this should not be their only option.' This approach is rooted in a well-meaning desire to help women in prostitution. But it is also profoundly negative because it respects the foundations of the sex industry and not just the women who participate in it. If this approach is adopted prostitution would be decriminalized and the sale of women would be legitimized in law.

[Well, trafficking women would not be possible, but only a free choice. But author Louise Brown does not see this...]

The purchase of sexuality would be sanctioned by the state and would be regulated by market mechanisms. However, I would argue that there has to be some limit to th logic of the free market because the free market is only really free for the very luckiest. Poor women and girls are not lucky. Their luck is as rare as their vulnerability is abundant. There are far, far too many people who profit from their vulnerability to change this in any meaningful way.

[Legalization of prostitution will not bring more prostitution, but more safety - and there are more measures possible to reduce it:
-- governments should offer good jobs also in the countryside
-- basic social institutions like widow rent and social welfare will evade 20% of the prostitutes and will evade selling of girls by criminal mothers
-- good schooling will reduce the girls in the prostitution market one more time
-- legal porno cinema will reduce the number of customers by 50% or so
-- legal free sexuality at home will reduce the number of customers one more time etc.]

7.14: Police, protection money and sexual service for police forces in the prostitution business

[Concerning police one has to know:
-- boy education in Asia is ridiculous WITHOUT youth magazines, WITHOUT youth education concerning sexuality, often WITHOUT knowing about women at all
-- in Vietnam in the countryside for example fathers are sleeping with the sons in the first room of the house, and mothers are sleeping with the daughters in the background of the house and sex life of the parents does not exist any more
-- in big parts of Asia WOMEN are educating their daughters to be sterile rating everything as "dirty" what is with sexuality, and men are driven to the brothels
-- sexual frustration in Asia is absolutely great and complex and nobody knows "why" because speaking about sexuality is often a taboo
-- and it can be that Asian police does not see precisely all the torture, manipulation and extortion which is committed to girls and young women in brothel prisons by the criminal mama-sans.

With this background one has to see the not educated men in Asian police often simply rating prostitutes as "dirty" persons and making jokes and downgrading and humiliating them instead of honoring and protecting them - because prostitutes are more honest concerning sexuality and they are often suffering a lot - often being sold by their own mother.

So here are the data of writer Louise Brown about police and prostitutes in Asia in the 1990s - ones again with many half truths and supplements]:

Police officers with brothels and traffickers in northern Thailand

Police forces give their blessing to prostitution. Some participate directly in the trade as clients and as the recipients of bribes and protection money. Some officers even own parts of the business. In northern Thailand police officers own brothels and they trade in girls. They do not take action against traffickers because they themselves form the largest single group of traffickers.

[But not the trafficker is the really criminal point, but the criminal Thai mothers selling their daughters and the criminal mama-sans brothel bosses torturing, manipulating and extorting girls and young women in brothels, these WOMEN are the main criminal points in this prostitution system in Asia - not only in Thailand].

Cambodia: relations between police, military and mama-sans

In Cambodia a survey by the International Organization for Migration revealed that many female brothel owners were married to policemen, and to military or border officials, or that they had very close contacts with them [12]. [This means as much as free sex service].

[12] Annuska Derks: Trafficking of Vietnamese Women and Children to Cambodia (Geneva: International Organization for Migration, 1998), p.35

Direct police involvement in the management and ownership of the sex industry appears to be more serious in mainland South-East Asia than anywhere else in the region, but the patterns, if not necessarily the scale [extension], are common everywhere.

Protection money for brothels urged by police

The police and the legal profession take a big cut from the selling (p.201)

of sex. Traffickers, brothel owners [mostly WOMEN] and sex workers pay protection money. There are no exceptions to this [with the exception of the mother selling her daughter]. Inevitably, the pay-offs to the police are greatest in those countries where prostitution is illegal. Many brothels set aside a significant proportion of their income to pay off the police.

[Thus: This protection money is like a tax, but the police forces are just drinking alcohol with it, or purchasing a new private car, or a house!]

Protection money in India and Pakistan

Indian police take their regular hafta. A survey undertaken in Delhi on behalf of [by the order of] the Indian National Commission for Women found that the police took around 20% of the fee that customers paid to the brothel owners for each sex act [13].

[13] Indian National Commission for Women: Societal Violence [violence in the society], p.14

Pakistani prostitutes pay their weekly bhatta to the police to avoid arrest. And there are other charges too. The women who work in the traditional red light area of Naipier Road in Karachi pay a tax to the police every time they travel from their homes. This was how an elderly brothel manager explained the arrangement:

<The police know who the girls are. We cannot go out of the road without them watching us. They make us pay 500 rupees (6 English Pounds) every time we leave. So we have to pay or the girls get arrested. It's worse now than it was because now the girls have to go out to entertain clients at parties and we have to pay more to the police. Business is bad these days.>

Protection money in Calcutta - protection money evading a raid

When a new girl arrives at a Calcutta brothel, the police are informed and a payment is made. Very little goes on in the brothels without the police having knowledge of it. Likewise very little goes on in police headquarters without brothel owners [mostly WOMEN] knowing all about it. If a raid is planned, police officers will tip off the brothel and receive a payment for their information. This is common practice throughout Asia.

Protection money in Thailand: payment for every infringement of law - example Mae Sai - Thai border police making much money

In Thailand the amount of bribe a police officer receives depends upon his rank - that is how much he is risking by protecting the brothel - and also on the number of girls in the brothel and the number of laws being broken. A large number of foreign, and hence doubly illegal, child prostitutes, for example, will reap large dividends for the local police. At the time of writing (p.202)

brothels in Mae Sai were paying the police 2,600 Baht (43 English Pounds) per month for each girl on their premises [territory]. This is equivalent to the cost of around fifteen purchased sex acts with a Burmese prostitute. In other words, the police receive a substantial portion of the income generated by the selling of sex in Mae Sai.

A posting [job] as a border guard in a prime trafficking area, or as a police officer in a red light area, can be very profitable. There is therefore competition to secure coveted [wanted] posts. In many instances bribes are paid to secure lucrative postings [jobs]. [For example] Thai officers compete to land jobs in Hat Yai police station so that they can take a cut in the lucrative sex trade generated by Malaysian men's sex trips to southern Thai brothels.

The Burmese prostitutes working in Thailand are defined as illegal migrants by the Thai authorities. In an effort to control migration from neighboring countries there are numerous checkpoints on roads from the Burmese and Cambodian borders. Transporting foreign prostitutes around the country therefore becomes problematic, as the women are relatively easy to identify [Burmese faces, Cambodian faces]. The sex business found an ideal solution to this problem: in many instances police escort the women. The young women who move from Mae Sai to the brothels of Chian Mai are taken there by police at a cost of 2,000 Baht (33 English Pounds) or about four times the price of the same journey in an air-conditioned luxury car. Significantly, no Thai police or border patrols have ever been punished for complicity in the trafficking of women.

Protection money in Bangladesh and India - fees in the buses

It is a similar situation in Bangladesh where there is stiff competition, and bribery is practiced in order to land a posting [giving a job] with the Bangladesh Rifles on the crossing points on the Indo-Bangladeshi border [14].

[14] Shamim and Kabir: Child Trafficking: The Underlying Dynamics (Dhaka: Center for Women and Children's Studies, 1998), p.27

Official complicity in the trafficking process is incredibly blatant [obvious] in these areas with border patrols implementing passage rates and even collecting fees on the buses.

The sex industry could not operate without police protection and connivance [secret consent]. In red light areas brothel owners work hand in hand with corrupt police officers. For example, Indian brothel (p.203)

owners arrange for the police to arrest women who are making demands and who they want to intimidate. When there is a crackdown [raid] on a brothel it is very often motivated by financial factors: the brothel has not paid sufficient protection money to the local police.

Protection money in Bangladesh and India: Indian border policemen as customers - bribes

Sexual favors as well as bribes are given to police and border forces. The police are some of the principal clients of sex workers throughout the region. A survey by the Marie Stopes Clinic of 3,000 'floating' or street prostitutes in Bangladesh revealed that the police constituted their main client group [15].

[15] Center for Women and Children's Studies: Trafficking and Prostitution (Dhaka, April 1997), p.14

Protection service for the police in Thailand

Sex workers consistently [again and again] mentioned that the police were regular clients. A Thai prostitute in Bangkok described the complex relationship with the police in this way:

<We know all the police in this area. They come to the brothel in their uniforms and sometimes say they will arrest us. Then they come back later as customers. And they want to be entertained for free or at special rates.>

NGOs in northern Thailand meeting police in the brothels - it's no brothel...

A similar phenomenon is found in northern Thailand. An official working for an organization that assists sex workers in the region explained the delicacy - and the hypocrisy - of the situation that they had to encounter on a regular basis. The organization sends teams to visit the brothels and to distribute information on HIV awareness to the sex workers and their clients. This becomes an exercise in dissembling when the clients enjoying themselves with the women are found to be senior and high-profile police officers. Both the members of the team and the police then go through a charade [monkey's theater] in which both pretend that the brothel is not a brothel and that the men are not there either to buy sex or to enjoy it as a perk [advantage] of the job. This allows everyone to save face, and for the team to continue their work without subsequent police interference.

Protection money in Nepal: sex for free for policemen

Sex workers in Nepal report that police officers demand sex (p.204)

without payment in return for their non-interference in the women's work [16]

[16] UNICEF: A Situation Analysis, p.xi

Those women who had been prostitutes in India stated that the Nepali police were worse than those they had encountered in India. Judging by the experiences of prostitutes in India this must mean that the Nepali police are outstandingly dreadful [horrible].

Example: woman brothel boss instructing the 15 years old girls to lie at the police to be 25 years old

A Nepali girl who was forced into prostitution in Mumbai painted a depressing but wholly typical picture of police manipulation and abuse [but the main manipulation came from the woman brothel boss "gharwali" instructing the girls to lie that they would be 25 years old also when they were 15:

<The police came into the building. There were about five or six of them and they talked to the gharwali and they started to look around the brothel. They made two of us stand up and turn around and they said we looked very young. We said we were twenty-five, like the gharwali had told us to say, although we were really fifteen. Then the police went away but three of them came back later and we had to entertain them. The gharwali said it was a favor for them.>

Indian police abusing a trafficked girl because she has no passport

Abuse of trafficked women and prostitutes is not confined [limited] to the brothels. It takes place in police stations too. A child who was trafficked from Bangladesh to Delhi for sexual abuse was rescued from her traffickers only to find herself in an even more terrible situation and abused by the very people who were supposed to protect her.

<Some of the people in the neighborhood realized what was happening to me because they could hear me crying. So they helped me to escape and they found one of my aunts who was also living in Delhi. I was taken to the police so that they could help me and punish the trafficker but instead they arrested me because I didn't have a passport. In the thanna [police station] I was locked in a room. It was like at the trafficker's house because five policemen raped me.>

The police officers involved in this crime were convicted and (p.205)

imprisoned for child rape. This is unusual and, unfortunately, there are many other similar cases that never come to light, never mind to trial.

Police and justice often mean: rape of prostitute cannot be - "they work"

Often terrible abuses of this nature are not even considered to be a crime because the rape of a prostitute - however young she may be - is considered to be a contradiction in terms. Prostitutes are not raped. They work.

An Asian Watch Report in 1991 stated that over 70% of women in police custody in Pakistan were subject to sexual or physical abuse [17].

[17] Asia Watch Report: Double Jeopardy [danger], January 1991

Pakistan with adaption of police law with no night stays of prostitutes in police stations and female police stations - mainly no realization - secret detention centers

Because these women were not in the protection of their families they were considered to be 'fair game' [free wild animals] by police officers. The treatment of prostituted women was inevitably the most dreadful of all. In response, the Pakistani government instituted a directive in 1996 that prohibited women from being kept overnight in police custody. Women's police stations were established and were staffed by female officers. However, the directive remained largely ignored. Reports from Lahore-based newspapers in the first six months of 1997 documented 52 cases in which violence was perpetrated upon women in police custody [18].

[18] Government of Pakistan: Report of the Commission of Inquiry for Women (Islamabad, August 1997), p.83

We can assume that the actual incidence of abuse is far higher than these figures indicate. What is more, the police effectively evade the directive by holding women in non-notified detention centers [19].

[19] Human Rights Commission of Pakistan: State of Human Rights in 1997 (Lahore, 1998), p.185

This means that they can still be abused - but in the safety of unofficial police custody [detention].

Example: police in India in Calcutta extorting high bribes or not helping anything with criminal customers

Sex workers consistently [again and again] complain that the police refuse to help them and that they cannot expect justice at the hands of the legal system. Like lots of women this experienced prostitute from Sonagachi in Calcutta had only negative things to say about the police:

<There are lots of problems being a sex worker. The worst are the police and the hoodlums [gangsters] and the fact that the rest of society looks down on us. The police want money from us and so do the hoodlums. They are always asking for donations for festivals - big donations that we cannot afford but if (p.206)

we don't pay they make problems for us. But then we can't go to the police because they ignore us because we are sex workers. Even when the customers are bad and violent with the women the police don't do anything because they think we deserve it. They don't help us.>

Example: law in Calcutta is making the situation for prostitutes more difficult

Women from the Durbar Mahila Samanwaya Committee, a sex workers' organization in Calcutta, are insistent that the existing laws covering prostitution in India make their lives more difficult. The law grants the police a license to extort money from the women and to abuse their positions of power. Sadhana Mukherjee, a charismatic leading figure in the organization, is candid [speaking honestly] about the difficulties imposed by the police. 'With knowledge we can help to prevent AIDS', she says, 'but there is nothing we can do about the police.'

Example: police raids are revealed to the brothel boss by inside informations - children are hidden

It is impossible to involve local police forces in genuine [real] crackdowns on red light areas and rescues of imprisoned girls without courting the danger of the whole operation being undermined by inside information leaking out to the brothels. A Bangladeshi street prostitute remembering her teenage years spent in a closed brothel [prison] in Calcutta related a familiar story:

<We always knew when there was going to be a police raid - even though that wasn't very often. The owner would hide the youngest girls and the older ones wouldn't serve any customers until she knew that the police wouldn't come back. The malkin [woman brothel prison owner] said she had some good friends in the police and that if we ran away they would put us in prison [police prison].>


Northern Thailand: police is protecting each other preserving sexual slavery in brothel prisons

Voluntary groups in Thailand report a similar situation. An organization that is concerned about child prostitution in northern Thailand and occasionally takes action to secure the release of children in brothels explains that it is impossible to work with the local (p.207)

police. It is not, they explained, because all the police are corrupt. The trouble is that no one is able to identify the incorruptible officers with any degree of certainty. If action needs to be taken in response to a case of sexual slavery, particularly of children, then the Crime Suppression Unit from Bangkok has to be called in. Working through the local police force guarantees that on the night assigned for the raid absolutely no one is to be found selling sex in Chiang Mai [province in northern Thailand].

Principle: Honest police officers - and corrupt police forces - some corrupt policemen can destroy a complete action

Of course there are honest police officers. But it takes only a minority of corrupt ones to destroy the reputation and the effectiveness of an entire force. Amod Kant is the Deputy Commissioner for Police in Delhi. He has taken a great interest in the trafficking of women and the issue of sexual slavery in the city, and has launched a large-scale, if intensely controversial, round-up of suspected child prostitutes. He outlines the difficulty in monitoring and controlling a situation in which the police have to cope with a sophisticated, quickly adapting industry that has the money to buy a minority of his officers. Senior police officers, he maintains, are committed to tackling the sex trade but they are hampered because they cannot always be confident of the sincerity of a very few junior officers.

I suspect that more than a 'few' officers are corrupt. This corruption extends far beyond the police's involvement in the ex industry. It is endemic. Part of the problem lies in the poor pay given to the police in many developing countries. Taking bribes is sometimes the only way that officers can feed their families. Protection money and sexual favors are rather like a perk in an otherwise rather unattractive job. It does not justify corruption but it goes a long way to explain it.

Example: Nepal with NGO - complaining about corrupt police

Gauri Pradhan is the director of the Child Workers in Nepal NGO, based in Kathmandu. He has in-depth experience of working with trafficked children and those who have returned from Indian brothels, and he is convinced of the necessity of working with the police in order to stem the trade. As a result he is anxious not to (p.208)

demoralize honest police officers by damning the whole institution with constant talk about universal corruption. He has a point. Programs have there fore been instituted among police officers to train them to spot and deal with traffickers. But this is just the easy bit. Devising [inventing] a training program to tackle a whole culture of corruption and gender bias is a much more complex task.


7.15: Law prohibiting slavery and human trafficking - mentality questions

Laws prohibit slavery and in many countries in Asia they also outlaw human trafficking. The sexual exploitation of women in prostitution continues, however, because it is acceptable in cultural codes that are constructed upon two fundamental premises [conditions]:

the first is that females can be bought and sold [sold by criminal mothers], and
the second is that men have the right to buy sex.

[WRONG!
The second is that females and girls may be tortured, manipulated and extorted by mama-sans being an offer for men by extortion.
And there is the third point: governments leave the population of the countryside in poverty systematically, and since 20 years many ministers in the governments are women
And only at the end of all this comes the man who can see the woman for some minutes not more].

These are the laws that matter. Terrible poverty and acute disparities in wealth encourage these laws to be implemented with savagery [terror].

It takes more than legislation to get rid of deep-seated cultural practices. It takes a seismic shift in attitudes. None of the women I met and who had been trafficked or sold into sexual slavery ever questioned the right of their families, or the agents, to sell them. Almost all said that what had happened was unfair and they bemoaned [deplore] their fate, but no one ever expressed their grief [sorrow] or anger in terms of the infringement of their rights.

These same women failed to express any faith in the legal systems of their own countries, or of the countries to which they were trafficked. They are skeptical about the police and the sincerity of the authorities in tackling traffickers and ending systems of sexual slavery. And it is only natural that they should feel this way. The law, the police and the lawyers are, with only minor exceptions, part of the very same power structure that incarcerated them in a brothel and put them up for sale (p.209).

[WRONG! Writer Louise Brown does not see the decisive points
-- criminal mothers selling their daughters
-- criminal brothel bosses (mama-sans, malkin, gharwali) torturing, manipulating and extorting the girls and young women converting them into capitalist victims for men
-- governments systematically neglecting the population in the countryside leaving them without jobs].

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